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User talk:Hypno-disc
Welcome Hi there, I managed to work out how to create screenshots without blur. SH2 itself has a keyboard combination for shooting pics with Alt+Q. When pressed, the game creates a .gif and saves it into the 'My Documents' folder. There Stronghold 2 and 'screen' folders are found. Open the files in Paint and edit them any way you want. Ixsc15 (talk) 00:02, January 14, 2013 (UTC) Hi there, It's been a time since we spoke to each other. How are you? I finally got time to work with SH2 and done several experiments with the lords and the game, mainly for completing details on the page. I replaced the images sections with galleries, as they can host more columns, offer some picture formats and its alignment can be set not only to the sides but center as well. I still have to work out how to get the missing lords' portraits (so far I had to google them as I can't shoot them with both PrtScrn and Alt+Q from the cutscenes) And the main reason I'm writing for, I could also get round to testing multiplayer. I was much delightful when the game didn't kicked me off to the main menu :) It was on 'Three Bridges', 1500 gold with Baron and three participants (with me), every estate already handed out. My color was green. The gameplay is going to be detailed, don't blame me :) I got the top-right corner, which has nothing to offer but so much wood. It is a defensive position as well, but stone is a bit costly process. I could easily place woodcutters, apple farms and bread production, a statue, some hovels, buildings to contain the annoying criminals, rats and filth, the Lord's kitchen and some weapons buildings. I started off with two fletchers for archers and one building for crossbowmen. Soon I placed the mercenary tent, but left it alone as I was low on gold this time. I gradually placed more apple farms and bakeries as wood came in. I also sold most of the food and wood to invest in more fletchers for crossbowmen (still had more leather from one single workshop to sell:) ) and stone. At this stage I had around 30 archers, 15 crossbowmen, the initial spearmen and archers (sold the spears already given in the armoury) and a lonely berserker. I finally stabilized my economy thanks to the food, wood and leather, so I started securing the northern bridge. I first captured the estate on the other side with a mere 6 berserkers and 2 catapults, then I gradually sent there groups of berserkers and archers to fortify that position. Meanwhile I kept recruiting archers and crossbowmen for defense and ended up with placing two bastions with mangonels and sealing off myself a long wall line. The red enemy (positioned by the top-left corner) used all his money up on some archers and outlaws with almost no production at all. He had some food producers and hovels with a statue covering the negative populatity factors, just a lone quarry to provide stone very far away. He sealed off the bridge to his settlement with an extremely small choke zone with lookout towers and sent most of his troops (a dozen archers and outlaws) to that position. I deployed some catapults there and it took quite a while to move forward, but suffered no casualties. The archers and berserkers made short work of the outlaws. Unfortunately, erecting a siege camp on my foothold and sending some laddermen to conquer the bridge, got noticed by the red lord and he withdrew his troops (with some losses) and deleted the entire area with the exception of a lookout tower. Meanwhile, the orange enemy in the bottom-left corner stabilized his position and sent a small group of spearmen focused on my troops in the foothold. These troops were easily killed by mine. Thanks to the Lord's kitchen (I bought in 5 units of each food) I could promote to Earl, which allowed me to construct fire ballistae. I was so glad to achieve this. I brought two, later four ballistae and started thinning out the red lord's troops at his backup defense line made from wooden walls and a lookout tower. The archers were left behind to guard the fortification, while the rest were sent forth to bring down the puny defense line. As my catapults were destroying the wooden walls, the orange enemy sent a much stronger raid to distract my archers. I noticed it just in time but the berserkers were far away. So I used the siege camp to hire 20 laddermen and sent this troops to block the enemy hobelars and berserkers path. Only a few of them got through and my archers could work freely to dispose of the raiders. I was so relieved when this bigger raid was deflected. Later on, I moved in with my troops to contain the red lord, but he escaped to the main menu rather than tolerating his defeat. Some moments later the orange lord, seeing my superiority and being a coward, retreated as well. This is how my first real multiplayer worked, hopefully you'll also be able to make yours to work as well. Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 11:27, January 26, 2013 (UTC) Hi there, I'm going to attempt a 1v1 game, set with a password "strongholdwiki" to test if your connection is working. Then, we can move on a 2v2 game as you have suggested. I'm ready to play! "For fame and glory!" - Swordsman Ixsc15 (talk) 18:22, February 1, 2013 (UTC) You'll find under the name 'Cassius II', the password is 'strongholdwiki'. :D Ixsc15 (talk) 18:47, February 1, 2013 (UTC) Hi, Thanks for your message! A short briefing for multi: - Learn to navigate between menus, buildings and practise placement. This is very straightforward to say, but it will come over time :) - Fire ballistae are devastating in skilled hands: when you create fire ballistae one by one, tell each ballista to get into one "group" (ctrl + 0-9 to assign). To call the "group", press simply 0-9 for the correspondent ballista (one more press to navigate to it). Since each group consists one ballista, it means that calling all of them in a short time, then assigning targets, will bring multiple casualties for the enemy. I will show it later. I will start the server and good luck! Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 20:15, February 2, 2013 (UTC) Hi there, I'm free to play in your suggested time. Message me when you are ready to fight and things will go the same as they did. Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 09:12, February 4, 2013 (UTC) Hi pal, I'm glad you fight victorious battles against our enemies. We need such matches you had for the last time: no exiting people during the match and successes in gameplay :) Then, give it a try and host a game. You'll encounter periodic lags (indicated by 'Waiting for players' displayed), but that's the game's flaw, nothing to worry about. It shows up about every 20 to 25 minutes and recovers in a few moments. I promised you a guide just before the match we fought against Sir Knight. Here's the link for the file: http://www.divshare.com/download/23682678-146 It is very short, but should cover most aspects of the gameplay. That's only a summary of my view for multiplayer, but useful in most terms. Some facts you may already now, but the tactics is worth to see. Feel free to comment it :) As with today's multi, I think BELT is really one-sided once either side took control over the center. Since you can't replace those bastions and host mangonels/ballistae in them, you're eventually pinned down and worn down to death (if handled properly). GL Evolution (or the original Grasslands) is very good to play, or I can share the 'Killer Map' beforehand (named RIP in my previous posts). For the latter here's another link (you'll need to have a filename like this due to uploading problems: 'Map ;).s2m): '''http://www.divshare.com/download/23682719-700 I'll more than likely to be available, so just set up the server in the desired time and/or notify me that you're ready :) 'I will lay siege on our common foe' - will you find out? :) Ixsc15 (talk) 10:04, February 5, 2013 (UTC) P.S.: I'm cleaning my talk page somewhat to leave place to newer messages. Hi, I'll be waiting as you said. One important thing in multi: I will be most likely to recruit crossbowmen, knights, horse archers and berserkers. I may also craft bows for some archers in defense, but reduce their numbers, as they pretty don't do much in battles (unless the enemies stick to weaker troops, but I can tell you: they won't :) ). I will cart you mostly iron, wood and bows, but don't be afraid to write your demand in the chat. I know that this is visible to others, but goods are more valuable than this fact. Some welcome presents should be expected as well :) Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 10:28, February 5, 2013 (UTC) P.S.: Also don't forget to check out my new walkthroughs submitted not a very long time ago. :) Hi, The two weapons you request are ones that I completely avoid to produce :) I build iron mines only for profit and I like to buy swords and metal armour for knights, as my economy tends to be very productive from sells and taxation. Never mind, I can utilize some armourers and poleturners for the job, but I like to set off traps with laddermen: they are cheaper (it doesn't matter too much) and they are recruitable in a siege camp, so they need less time to reach their location. You made me think twice that pikemen are actually effective: they are weak in close combat, but their armour makes them able to absorb some punishment. As I use multiple fletchers but consider producing way less archers than before, I may convert some of them to poleturners and armourers, balancing out spears and pike production. I heavily suggest you use crossbowmen in your defenses against tinmen. Knights amassing in great numbers are very destructive and it is urgent to get rid of them very early. Combine them with ballistae and see the result! :) I generally don't suffer from shortages except for the very beginning in the game. I always find I can't have enough flour, as bakers always take it away and I build few mills, but this is solved later. Crossbows might be a constant problem to produce, so if you can, supply me with them (don't need huge loads though, but I always end up buying them, when I'm under attack or replace fallen crossbowmen). The goods are on the way, my lord! Ixsc15 (talk) 11:48, February 5, 2013 (UTC) Hi again :D I only need crossbows for shipment. I can really work my way to produce the other weapons/armour/whatsoever, only crossbows are always used up from my inventory. I invest in huge stacks of gold to buy them, but I'd spend it on other goodies so it'd definitely be better. I hope requesting crossbows is a managable request, as a return favour? :D And expect reinforcements to come to your aid if you're really in trouble, I'm just generous :D Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 12:02, February 5, 2013 (UTC) Right, any spare goods for profit is always welcome, although some of those bows may be used for defense. Pity that in-game actions are much more limited than in Crusader. You could choose any kinds of goods at 5 different measures, and you could send even gold. They are transferred automatically to your stockpile/gold balance. You could also give orders to attack/request help or goods, which notifies the other player to do something for you and last, but not least, you can choose which players to chat with. It is very depressing to message via the lonely global chat. Still, the carters vulnerability give a good chance to make SH2 much more realistic than its counterpart. Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 12:20, February 5, 2013 (UTC) Hi there, In the meantime, I got an idea on how to tempt players to join in: right before setting up the server, next to your name insert "2v2" or something like that. That should prevent confusion and makes things easier. You had a great defense, but got overrun: bastions are weak and they don't handle much damage over time. If only I hadn't disbanded my horse archers by accident (the "stop" button is right above the "disband" one) In our previous game, Sir Knight easily took off two thirds of my bastion's health with a barrage of 20 catapults. I had hard time repairing those towers, buying in some stone and replacing mangonels. That's a nice task to accomplish, but soon horse archers won. I enjoyed the game and we'll accomplish a lot, I swear! It'd better be worth it! - Outlaw Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 16:48, February 5, 2013 (UTC) Hi there, I'm also fine at the suggested time (right now), so let's play then :) Warrior monks are good units, it's true. When you pump out honor in a vast amount, they can be used very well. It is superior to the fighting monk, who carries a giant earpick, barely useful against troops. But, as you said, they are weak to missile fire. You may have noticed that I create many missile troops, meaning you need to apply them in huge numbers. By luck, SH2 is somewhat poor when it comes to targeting. I think that it forms groups by troops adjacent to each other, as I always see horse archers to concentrate most of their fire on single targets (some arrows hit other targets, but that's way too less). Needless to say, bringing down warrior monks is easier to be done than said. Nevertheless, they are a valuable unit in defense. You'll have a hard time to spam them on enemies, who are strong enough to fend off powerful attacks with a great defense either in the field or the castle, but with precise timing, you can achieve wonderful results (particularly on the AI :D ) "History awaits us!" - Knight Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 15:20, February 6, 2013 (UTC) Waiting for you, join in! :) Hi again, Eventually I started a multi 2v2 on BELT. Participants: "RED CIOUD" with orange, "Vjkdf" with green and "Chrisx... " with light blue. 7500 gold, banned trebs and a set peace time with around 10 game years. I allied with CIOUD. Thanks to the peace time, it didn't matter how fast you build up, just don't attack the others. It was ridiculous to see when the two sides assembled in the two estates in the middle. Numerous knights, catapults, fire ballistae, horse archers and cats assembled to the big battle. Both armies suffered casualties, and the frontline moved minimal away. The enemy alliance depleted all its capacity and the my ally kept bringing cats and catapults, so I decided to use up my 50-60 free places in my army. I recruited 50 Pictish boatmen and assembled them on the nearby bordering waters. This small force was sneaking up the green enemy's territories (his land was not entirely walled) until I reached the small passageway. I tested my boatmen's skills and they filled in quite a big section of moat later to be shot down by ballistae. Macemen tried to intervene, but the gate remained well shut so they got stuck inside. I quickly assembled another army of 60 boatmen and this time they were commanded directly to the Lord. The moat was replaced but a flat land section was available to dock. I suffered little casualties on the way, so it seemed to work. By bad luck, the lord was attending a mass, so I had to move the boatmen all the way across the lands, so the green enemy noticed them on the half way. He quickly got some mounted knights and they would have killed my men, if I didn't disband them. After that, the "victim" enclosed his territories and placed some towers with ballistae to cover the waters I used. Finally, some kind offensive begun, but we could retailiate and cause some losses to the enemy. Chris had little time, and I'd got to go too, so we left the game. I did everything I could, although my tactics could have proven more successful, if my timing had been perfect. "(proudly)Another estate has turned to the side of light!" - Lady Seren taking an estate in Kingmaker Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 23:36, February 6, 2013 (UTC) Hi there, Thanks for the war communique. I see that you handled the situation very well. In Freeman games, skill is needed much more in building up than fighting in the battlefield. I hadn't fought one yet in multiplayer, but in Kingmaker, some AI starts right out with 'Duke' conditions and it gains a huge stock, which it uses to quickly build an army (the Queen, the King, Edwin, the Bull and Olaf, respectively). Therefore it is vital to defend yourself with your inferior troops quite well. As with assassins, I'd mention Crusader, as the first game it was introduced in. Assassins have their stealth ability, but with a much higher range they are detectable in. And they are much cheaper at a mere 60 gold. They are very common troops (there is the Nizar which sends only assassins and fire slaves to kill you) in multiplayer as well, where in numbers they were just ineffective against a well-built hedgehog defense, or moat (they cannot fill them in). Even the AI editors found a combination of low and high walls to make it impossible to get in. As in Stronghold 2 its price is extremely high, you can barely afford some of them by terms of honor. You spend honor on knights and cheap troops, and masses/feasts/dances are not very common to hold. In stock maps, it is next to impossible to build an economy focused on honor because of inefficiency. These multi-focusing maps are designed for mass production (including honor harvesting), as it is boring to spend most of the time to build up your army waiting for knights and fancy troops. Other than that, finding an alternate way to bring the enemy to its knees is just a good scouting on the battlefield. Tactics and generals always sought for these routes (like I used pictish warriors in my last game as an attempt). Assassins are not that hard to defend against. Just use some moat with a large gatehouse with plenty of defense and your day is saved. Build thick moats (4-5 tiles tight) so you'll see on the map when a section of moat starts disappearing. Use man traps in front of the moat to filter them or some guards on the walls in defensive stance. Assassins will get pinned down by your awaiting troops, who provide your missile units to execute them. I'm ready at the suggested time and I'll host the server. Please, let's use no peace time (pt) if possible. Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 09:41, February 7, 2013 (UTC) Hi there, It's a bit night when I'm writing, but I could get round to writing by now. The multiplayer we were playing got rather tedious after you exited. The similar frontline-attrition thingie was coming, as I should have expected. I didn't put much effort to keep the line however, but it was just tempting to kill the other lord with strategy. The green lord kept producing cats, catapults, trebs and other sorceries and pushed forward, but I harassed him quite a lot. I slowly assembled some pictish warriors, to be ready to make a boat trip. The teal lord was inactive, but walled himself quite much in, blocking the way into the castle. However, I got fed up with that and I set up 10 mangonels, targeting each mangonel as far as I could. Because of their inaccuracy, the teal lord's side walls got slowly consumed by catapulted rocks, so finally I could move in with 102 pictish warriors via a safe route and the lord got clubbed by the boatmen's rows. Meanwhile, your abandoned lord got killed too, but I didn't see how it was done. I was falling back, when suddenly the game exited, leaving the green punk to be the lonely winner. I think it's high time we found a better map for a 2v2, as one choke point proved very little joy. Even the other maps are quite a challenge, where the multiple thousands of bears and outlaw camps are found in the middle, but they get bugged when someone exits because of the preplaced moat, remaining unremovable. Maybe you may have noticed that I highlighted important aspects in walkthroughs and from now on, in character descriptions to the Kingmaker section by making them italic and underlined. Do you think this is a useful thing to do? 'I wissssh I could get drunnnnk like everyone else. It just doesn't seem to af-fect meeee. (hic) - Female Peasant, after having the inn visited Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 22:46, February 7, 2013 (UTC) Hi there, Good name for you! It is a pity that he was killed in the War of Roses, but you should defend the House of Lancaster with pride and determinity! I'm waiting you, you can host the server. Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 20:13, February 10, 2013 (UTC) Hi, I'm glad that Vic can soon join us to the battleforge, soon hosting :) As with SH3, it has got a generally bad reception. The game was released way earlier than it could be finished and it needed a swarm of patches to make up for the initial flaws. Firefly stated it was due to financial and copyright managements (third-party companies sponsored FF at that time). I haven't played it, but it has some facts, which can be quite unwelcome. One of the most annoying aspects is popularity and population system derived from SH Kingdoms (a very good network game, free at all and play it, if you got the time, I'm sure I don't have it :( ). Hovel population is based on the distance from the keep: the farther it is, the less people inhabit it. It's just cruel. The other is the popularity: there is a counter for leaving/joining the castle, which resets at very long intervals. It sums up all the factors and you'll see a great dropdown from 100 to 65, then climbing back immediately at 83 for instance. It is very detailed in graphics, but critics and fans condemn its aspects. It is clearly seen that this game is unfinished. Anyway, if you want to taste SH3, I highly recommend you played Crusader. The original Stronghold only consists of 4 characters, but Crusader has a bit more detailed storyline and a more resembling gameplay: introduced mercenary post, fire ballistae, killing pit (similar to man traps in SH2) and 16 AI characters (with Warchest, but you can torrent it) in a very customizable skirmish mode. 'Let's ride!' - Knight Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 17:10, February 11, 2013 (UTC) P.S.: The server is live! Hi comrade, This was an amazing game! Both of us had successful wars, battles and the glory to take the scalp of the hostile resistants! Shall we have another game? You can mail me on the live chat for a real-time talk:) Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 20:11, February 12, 2013 (UTC) Hi comrade, Long time we've talked to each other. How are things going? I've done some work with some of the AI castles in the past few weeks. I have completely redone some castles, most of them is quite tight. I tried to leave the original style of the AI (defense engines, rolling logs, moat, etc.), but also maximize the efficiency as well with building multiple gatehouses, towers and less vulnerable wall segments. For example, the Bull's layout has added lookout towers for overall defense. All characters have 1 castle each to use (the Bishop, Olaf and the Queen has no castles yet). Just extract the '.zip' file to the SH2\castles folder, then feel free to play. I also include the utillity I used to compile the custom templates so that you can edit the existing castles as well :) Links: *my reworked AI castle templates: http://www.divshare.com/download/23738115-1da *the AI editor I used: http://www.divshare.com/download/23738149-168 I'm available in the entire day today, so we can have a multiplayer at any time. I can host the game, hoping no kickouts will occur. I'm very sure it had nothing to do with our connection, as an other player must have been lagging very much (like a paper being pulled from two opposite sides, eventually tearing it apart). All credit goes to the stronghold-knights.com staff, Aubergine and LordBritian. Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 10:13, February 17, 2013 (UTC) P.S.: I'm available after 11:00 GMT, as I've got some work to do. Hi there, I kind of liked this great game! Teamwork on the top, smooth economies and great war of attrition! Matze was too easy-going not to take control over the strait. Imagine how hard it would have been if he also sets up a hedgehog (let's call it an array of cats, horse archers and knights butted together). As Sir Knight was purely offensive with this, Matze was just slow at building up his troops. The green guy also had a flourishing economy, bummer he quit and left his teammate alone. Don't be afraid to use up the iron and stone deposits with maximum efficiency, the hardcore powerhouse of economy will just produce thousands of gold coins in no time :) I also found -12 to -16 taxes very neat, as 252 gold per month provides a great influx. I assume I'm available tomorrow at this time (19.00 GMT or so), hoping that Victoria can also join to our side:) Finally, let me share your victorious moments of the warrior monks at this link: http://www.divshare.com/download/23758212-984 'The devil is afoot!' - warrior monk Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 20:59, February 20, 2013 (UTC) Problems! D8 why does electronics hate me so? Emm hi. I don't know what happened to my last message as it apparently merged with Ixsc15 and you didn't reply? Anyways, I'm having issues with SH2. I installed it on my laptop after having to uninstall it from my father's laptop (sucks I know but what can you do.) but when I try to update, it suddenly hits a problem and then the whole thing starts configuing my files and after that SH2 literally can't be played because some file is missing. (d3dx9_27.dll), I also hit the same problem on my father's laptop. I haven't tried to play SH2 without updating so I will see if that solves the issue (meaning I will have to unistall it and reinstall and then try to play it without the updates), I should also mention my laptop is windows 7 and not window xp so I'll assume the game just isn't compatible with windows 7. If playing without updates fails I'll see if I can get it to work on the family pc. Victoria Hi mate, I'm ready to play SH2. I changed my name as seen in my user profile, as I want to make my place of birth more noticable. Anyway, I'm still the original Cassius II and you can call me the same as before :D Notify me if you are ready to join! Either of us can host. Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 17:28, February 22, 2013 (UTC) Hi there, Hi, I'm ready to play, sorry for posting my last message without logging in... I start uploading Crusader walkthroughs, feel free to read them whenever you want! See you on my side, Ixsc15 (talk) 15:50, February 25, 2013 (UTC) Hi! Very good fight, should have been finished Funébre earlier if his quarries and mines are disposed of, but never mind. Being a pure defensive player is just offering yourself to the enemy. I noticed that Funébre had withdrew his troops upon his towers began crumbling. I (and you definitely) have seen more aggressive players, who were just kept sending burning carts and knights, but this adversary was just a turtle. I have captured again several screenshots, I'll upload it to my divShare profile and hand the links to you. I consider packing it into a zip file as I have around a dozen of them :) Our teamwork is very all-round and 99% effective, none shall stand before us alive! Should we have another game? Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 18:43, February 25, 2013 (UTC) That's just ridiculous:) In this latest game, when I controlled my big bundle of units in 'player de merde's territory, I had non-chosen units' health bars indicated. This was the most annoying when the ballistae were active and my knights' health did also appear, but this was only a visual bug, they were not active and just stood at their place. One really annoying bug I often encounter in Kingmaker is stuck criminals. I usually rotate the hovels to conserve space, but somehow the criminal stays at the building he used to work at and just keeps glancing left and right (as he does for a brief moment before sneaking to the granary casually). Maybe it is because the hovel is inaccessible he belongs to (but most of the time, it isn't). I encounter this mostly at wheat farms, but once a chandler's workshop was also bugged. Nevertheless, it is not that common. And one last advice: if you ever build, don't place the inn far from the houses! I had one guard at the hovels and the inn was next to the quarryside and a criminal got there and successfully raided my granary. I then got fed up with it and built the inn much closer then walled it in. That's a neat way to keep workers doing their jobs :) Ixsc15 (talk) 19:29, February 25, 2013 (UTC) Hi again Michael, I finally got the game working thanks to Cassius ;) Hi! I'm ready to play right now. I'm also glad to announce that my prototype blog is created and the first shots are uploaded :) Hopefully, I won't have to use the divShare account to share links anymore, pictures are just fine. Let me know if you (and perhaps Victoria) are also able to play, I'm going to host. Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 16:26, March 1, 2013 (UTC) Hi again:) I found a screenshot not long ago, which is the result of a very strange bug. In the Hawk's nest mission, when Pascal and the Bull attacks, the Hammer's army didn't show up. In fact, it showed up, but all these troops appeared as red knights, stacked on each other (the knights are a bit blurry by the comparably delayed animation). I couldn't move them, nor control them and stayed in their place for the entire game. They didn't move either, but it was a great relief to decimate one army less than it should have been. Nevertheless, it was still a good fight. After the Hawk's and the Bull's army was mostly dead, I have seen several macemen, laddermen and archers retreating down, attempting to flee the map, only to be welcome by my bugged knights. They got rid of them in no time, but I still couldn't take any advantage of them besides this fact. Anyway, how was your weekend? Mine was busy, but fast-moving, nothing to get bored with. I'm available to play today from 16:30 GMT till the evening, if you are interested in a match :) Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 09:39, March 4, 2013 (UTC) Hello there, I'm open to a game in the suggested time and I'm really looking forward to playing :) I haven't talked to my friend with multiplayer yet, but I'll soon come up with the topic in the near future. I will tell you if he eventually decides or refuses to play, no worry. Feel free to edit my blog post (I don't know if it is possible by others) or send me a link pointing to the screenshots. I suggest we keep a basic layout of these shot collections: date as a 'heading 3', map and game conditions, player (alliance) constitutions, finally pictures. If you have few pictures (2-3), add them in a gallery. For more pictures, use a slideshow, as it takes up much less space than individually placed shots. I chose to add titles to the shots, as this makes them funnier and returns the game (battle, situ)'s actual feeling :) Here's the times I'm basically free in this week (weekdays are fit to university, times in GMT): Monday: 16:30 < Tuesday - Thursday: 19:00-19:15 < Friday: 14:30 < (this) Saturday-Sunday: free for all day, nothing to be planned yet Upon your notification I'll host the game:) Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 16:36, March 4, 2013 (UTC) Hi there, How about a short game tonight? I can host if that also fits you:) Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 19:18, March 5, 2013 (UTC) Hi there, I also support the idea of an own blog. I suggest to keep it rather personal, as it is a blog literally :) I would also share my own contents with you, still not knowing if the blog supports third-party editing. If that's not the case, I can still post contents or share the links pointing to my outside library. Thanks for your notification, I expect your Steele pic :) Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 11:14, March 6, 2013 (UTC) At the moment, I'm online from my notebook in the university. I can take notes while the lecture is going on, mastering this is crucial :) Unfortunately I'm kind of unavailable to play (very slight chance though), as I have this day since 8:00 till 19:00 (local time), spending an additional 2 hours of travelling back and forth. I can accept days when I'm between 10:00 and 19:00 in uni, although this day is quite hardcore for me :) The lesson from 8:15 became compulsory in the very last minute, but life is hard at times, you know :) Ixsc15 (talk) 11:58, March 6, 2013 (UTC) Hiya :) Haha yeah, it was a bit weird though. It's a shame that the game didn't come up with a instruction manual(prefers paper than a on screen one), else without Doka I wouldn't have got it to work at all. :) I need to ask you something once I meet you in form so seeya later! P.S Sorry for the mega late reply >.>' Victoriouslife (talk) 10:11, March 8, 2013 (UTC) Hey, Finally I can have a free afternoon for a multiplayer from 15.00 GMT. I'm yours for the entire day, are you in it? :) Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 11:02, March 8, 2013 (UTC) Hi, I'd agree to set up an edit rules page. It's true that we're the ''de facto admins of the page, but the official admin of this page is Zeta. We could propose ourselves as administrators possibly at him, if we'd ask. Until then, I wouldn't title us as admins. Nevertheless, I support the idea 100% :) Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 15:05, March 8, 2013 (UTC) Hi Michael, I deeply understand that you are bored of spams and fight against them. I also do hate them, but here's something: *Uppercase letters are the indicators of nervousness and bad-temper. Nethics would (and will) not accept them and some sites punish repeated use of these if you are a client, not a moderator. *Threatening users is not an effective way to handle spams. Not only you discourage visitors to use this wiki, but you also become impulsive at some point. *Finally, making own rules is ineffective if the majority is not involved and did not agree to adhere to them. Personally I support your attempts to fight, but with measure and without taunts, threats and cruel punishments. Another note to a content that has been removed: no one is obliged to report edits to moderators and admins. These activities are visible in multiple windows and you can restore previous versions of pages if there is something irrelevant there. You can even see the differences between two versions. This is 'a free wiki that anyone can edit'. Spams are not that annoying problem that we should cry about. In my 4 months' experience here, I only encountered two spam-edits and two pre-existing spams. That counts up as a total of 4 (!) events. Reverting the original pages is not very hard (one click to prev. version and another one to use the backup version) and does not require too much effort. Please, handle everything with measure. We are only 'de facto' administrators and we have got no more opportunities than an average user. Keep that in mind in order to not get involved into conflicts. Thanks, Ixsc15 (talk) 16:16, March 8, 2013 (UTC) Hi, On my way. Ixsc15 (talk) 19:03, March 8, 2013 (UTC) Hi comrade, I've got a good bunch of screenshots. Shall publish them soon... Should we have another game, this time you as the host? Ixsc15 (talk) 19:37, March 8, 2013 (UTC) Hi mate, I had another game, a 3v3 right after our (seemingly) short game. It was on a Grasslands variant, all players are German. All my allies were busy with themselves, I got impaled by an enemy and all was just a matter of luck. It started on Freeman. I was progressing quite well ahead of the others and had an early attempt of attack against the green player (Lord Stronghold, not to mention) with a bunch of armed peasants and archers. I retreated well after the harassment. I got to Duke in the same time the green enemy had. He had amassed burning carts, horse archers and a handful of knights, building multiple siege camps and eventually catapults rained upon my walls. I used everything I could: ballistae, catapults, crossbowmen, archers, horse archers and knights, but all my efforts proved ineffective. I could slowly reinforce my defense garrison, but they were constantly removed by ballistae. Still, enemy mantlets and units kept falling. Somehow a single tile of wall was missing and the green guy noticed it. His burning carts and mantlets infiltrated and burned half of my economy to ashes. I literally pissed from frightening, as I couldn't imagine ever that I could commit such a mistake despite my long time in Stronghold. From that point, everything became nuts: rats and criminals running all over the place, horse archers camping my campfire and knights razing my territory showed that my time had come. Finally, I died right in front of the keep, as a symbol of despair. All the players were indifferent and egoist. They titled me an amateur after my weak attempt and after my surrender, the green guy stated that I was caught because of my rush. None of my allies did care about me, but they had the courage to announce that my buildings are on fire, my knights are idle and congratulated the enemy. That's just disgusting and pure carelessness. I think that I derailed myself by not using wheat farms, but apple farms. I wasn't ever satisfied with the amount of gold I always got from food salaries. I also lately recognized that the maximum number of peasants is 96 at six players and Freeman, so I had peasant shortages most of the time. That's a sad but useful experience. I also want to see if a Hungarian player ever hosts a game (rarely, but I see some). Never I have played with one :) Check out the blog for updates (work still in progress) :) Cheers and don't blame me for the long war communique: Ixsc15 (talk) 21:18, March 8, 2013 (UTC) P.S. - Fun fact: Hungary is one of the four countries in the world that uses surnames before names (the others are Cambodia, Japan and China). Consequently, my name is Zsolt and my surname is Doka. 'Zs' is a two-letter consonant, pronounced like 'j' (try to say 'z' and 'sh' together). It is up to you which one you call me, I'm not (and won't be) hurt if you call me Doka as you did by then. Just thought I'd share this with you :) Hi there, Are you available some time in the afternoon? I can play without limit, you can host a game when you are ready. Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 15:13, March 10, 2013 (UTC) Hey, No problem. Just message me when you are here:) Ixsc15 (talk) 17:18, March 10, 2013 (UTC) Okay, the server is becoming live in a moment. :) Sorry mate, I had to quit because of those multiple map loading issue bugs. Could you please host a game so that we can play peacefully? Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 18:05, March 10, 2013 (UTC) Hi my liege, I'm proud to admit that the hostile vangaurd of Visnouk and the evil Richard is vanquished! I had quite an easy task, as I dominated the battlefield and the enemies were not active too much. The green player targeted trebuchets on our hedgehog and built multiple bastions stationing there archers and crossbowmen. Pity I had 35 catapults pounding his walls and towers, so all the units fell off the top and died mid-air. This caused Visnouk to leave, fighting your dark adversary. I also had to deflect two minor attacks of warrior monks and hobilars (got some nice screenshots about them). I could move my cluster forward (sacrificing your small army, which eventually attacked the defenders), destroying trebuchets and wall segments on the way. As Visnouk had no walls at all, I got fed up with the situation and I moved in my 14 mounted knights to get rid of the green lord. They lost their mount to horse archers and remaining bowmen, but they finally made their way into the castle. Visnouk had a light guard of spearmen and archers, which was an easy task to eliminate. He soon met his fate, losing all his buildings and units, including the initial defense line he created. Richard had a late reinforcement (being unaware that Visnouk exited) of 30 pikemen, who were disposed of my knights, losing only 2 units in the process. As I got a friendly estate next to Richard, I could build siege camps much closer to his territory. I took the opportunity and built two of them, amassing catapults, cats and eventually ballistae. 50 catapults levelled the weak defense line of two square towers and walls. I also noticed wooden traps, so I sent in some laddermen to clear the way. Unfortunately, when I could move forward, I lost some troops to killing pits (but no knights). While I was moving in, Richard had to go, so he couldn't live his defeat but the game was virtually over at this point. A unique tactic I hadn't seen in multiplayer (but in single player) that someone recruited engineers on foot. They can repair walls when there is stone in the stockpile. Richard assembled some 40 engineers who held stone blocks and moved back and forth to repair the breached walls tile by tile. They quickly fell when I moved in with my troops. Some ballista removed the archers and crossbowmen on the keep's roof. The final confrontation happened with a dozen knights. I had to lure them out with my own knight and I could time my catapult barrage well to fire at the campfire, sending the guards into air and death. Soon my knights became victorious (a well deserved and not empty victory). Check out my blog for updated screenshots. Cheers, Ixsc15 (talk) 21:04, March 10, 2013 (UTC)